


The Song of Silencer

by sagansjagger



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Hurt, Endgame Luka Couffaine/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Gen, Hurt Maybe Comfort, Hurt Partial Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Identity Reveal, One-Sided Attraction, One-Sided Lukanette, minor descriptions of blood
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-12
Updated: 2020-09-12
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:46:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26428078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sagansjagger/pseuds/sagansjagger
Summary: At Hawkmoth's urging, Silencer decides to use Ladybug's stolen voice in a different way... with devastating effects.
Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Luka Couffaine/Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug
Comments: 79
Kudos: 73





	The Song of Silencer

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Squishysib](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Squishysib/gifts).



“You know what to say, Silencer,” Hawkmoth said in Silencer’s head, the purple mask floating in place around his eyes. “Don’t fail me now.”

Ladybug and Chat were standing before him in the hallway of Montparnasse Tower, with her gripping a red, black-spotted desk lamp. 

“Haha, you thought you had us, didn’t you, Silencer!” Chat was saying, gesturing to Ladybug with a thumb. “But you were wrong! Ladybug still has her superpowers!”

With a smug smirk, Ladybug brandished the lamp.

 _That’s impossible! I took your voice from you!_ Silencer thought and wanted to say. _How could you still have your Lucky Charm?_

But Hawkmoth interrupted his thoughts. “Do it,” Hawkmoth said. “Say the phrase in her voice.”

Silencer raised his hand. He didn’t understand what Hawkmoth wanted, didn’t know why the man insisted on seizing the miraculous of this young, hapless girl. Silencer knew he had a part to play, though, so he would play it to help Marinette. 

Marinette. He meant what he said to her. She was the most extraordinary girl. As clear as a musical note and as sincere as a melody. She was the music that had been playing inside his head since the first day they’d met.

And the only things standing in Silencer’s way from helping her get revenge on Bob Roth, the scoundrel who’d harmed her, were the upstart superheroes. Silencer could help Hawkmoth, if Hawkmoth would keep his end of the bargain.

Silencer pinched the air, forcing Ladybug’s voice to say the fateful word: “Dé-transformation.”

Ladybug’s mouth dropped open as if she were gasping, but no sound came out. The desk lamp fell from her hands, the bulb shattering at her feet. Pink transformation light washed over her from her feet to her head, revealing a small, red creature and--Marinette.

Silencer’s hand pinched around the shout he made in Ladybug’s voice. “No! It can’t be… Marinette!”

“Marinette?” Chat whispered, reaching out for her. 

“Marinette!” the creature said. Eyes wide at Silencer, she flew into Marinette's purse.

Marinette opened her mouth in a silent scream, tears welling in her eyes. Dropping to her hands and knees, she appeared to be dry heaving without the accompanying noises of sobs. Silencer’s heart tore in his chest. The girl he loved was in pain. Pain he’d caused her. 

Hawkmoth crowed triumphantly in his head. “Yesss! Do it, Silencer! Take her earrings!”

Chat placed a hand on Marinette’s shuddering back. He looked up at Silencer, snarling. “How could you?”

Silencer gripped his head, slamming his eyes shut. Maybe this was all a bad dream. Maybe this was all fake. Maybe if he pretended none of this had ever happened, he could drown out the victorious laughter in his head. 

He opened his eyes again. No, no good. Marinette was still there on the floor in front of him, panic etched in her trembling shoulders. She looked to be desperately mouthing something--”transform moi!” if Silencer had to guess. He backed against the locked doors, compressing his spine and his hips against them.

He wrung his hands, wondering if he broke his fingers and couldn’t talk anymore, the nightmare would be over. His palms gathered sweat in his heart lines--and his heart itself slammed in his chest.

 _What have I done?_ He rubbed the heel of his palm against his sternum, trying to soothe the ache there. His shoulders ratcheted up to his ears. His face felt unbearably hot under his mask, and he felt the sting of unshed tears high in his nose.

Given that Silencer wasn’t attacking them, Chat appeared to have forgotten him. Ladybug’s--Marinette’s--Ladybug’s partner tried comforting her again, whispering soft words that Silencer could only pick out bits and pieces from. “--promise--” “--win--” “--be okay.”

Silencer jumped at the sounds, anguish and anxiety licking his brain. He wished he had his fidget spinner ring, but to have that back, he’d have to detransform.

Marinette clutched at her arms, the tears rolling down her cheeks and dripping off her chin to plonk on the floor below. She was still speaking frantically, her eyes wide and darting about, as if she were scared an ambush could come at any moment, from anywhere.

As if Silencer could attack the girl he loved. 

“What are you doing, Silencer?” Hawkmoth roared. “Take her earrings! You’re so close!” 

Silencer shook his head. Ladybug’s voice broke in his hand. “No! I won’t! I c-can’t.”

“You will!” Hawkmoth growled, and pain made Silencer’s vision scream white. He grit his teeth against the agony, clenching his fists and breathing heavily. 

_No,_ Silencer--Luka--Silencer thought, ready to pass out from the full-body torture Hawkmoth was giving him. Luka was not going to betray Marinette further. He would die first. 

His body seized, racked with uncontrollable shaking as his nerves were lit on fire. Silencer opened his hands, letting loose a deafening series of shrieks, overlapped in a variety of voices he’d stolen. Ladybug bawled the loudest. 

He couldn’t see. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t _breathe_.

Silencer bit a hole through his lip and tasted blood. Sweat poured down his face in rivulets. Lightheaded, he dropped to his knees, clutching his chest, as that seemed to be where the pain radiated outwards from. He couldn’t really tell, anymore--at first he thought it was his heart about to burst, then his hands breaking, then his brain. 

Then, as suddenly as the torment had begun, it stopped. Purple bubbles flowed over him and left a confused Luka and a purple butterfly in their wake.

Luka wondered why he was on his knees in... Montparnasse Tower? More importantly than that, he wondered why his whole body was in excruciating pain. 

But even more importantly than that, he wondered why the formerly-silent hallway--how did he know the hallway was formerly silent?--was filled with Marinette’s desperate cries. 

His heart ached for her. He wanted to go to her, but someone was by her side already, patting her back.

She was kneeling in front of him next to… Chat Noir? Of all people. 

A purple butterfly fluttered in front of Luka’s eyes. He was abruptly terrified--was Marinette going to be akumatized? “Chat!” Luka shouted, heedless of his pain. “The akuma!”

“Cataclysm!” Chat yelled, closing his bubbling right hand around the threat. He held his fist tightly clenched for a moment but then released his fingers. A pile of ash floated to the floor. He glared at his ring, which chirped at him. 

Marinette started, staring up at him with wide eyes. "Chat, you have to go! Your identity--" 

"I don't care!" Chat bit out, his clawed hand fisting on her black jacket, bunching the fabric. "I won't leave you!" 

Luka had no idea what was going on, why Chat Noir would be attached to Marinette so fiercely. Luka didn't want to get between them, but he did want to comfort Marinette, who looked close to panicked. 

"You have to," she hissed at Chat, who jumped at the fierceness of her tone. 

Chat looked away, his lower lip quivering. His ring chirped. He growled, his teeth gritted, and then turned back to her. "Marinette, I can't just leave you here!" 

"I am the one person who really needs to not know who you are," Marinette said, leaving Luka wondering what she meant. "If Hawkmoth..." Her gaze softened. She laid a hand on his shoulder, which he bit his lip at. "Please, Chat. Please. For me?"

Chat curled his lip back, baring his teeth. Without removing his left hand from Marinette’s back, he glared at Luka. Chat’s voice burst from his lips in a wretched rasp. “Take care of her, Luka Couffaine!”

Luka didn’t need to be told twice. His body racked with agony with every movement, he leapt forward and enveloped Marinette in a tight hug, shoving aside the broken desk lamp with his knees and crunching the glass under his jeans. Chat extricated his hand, snarling, and fled. 

Marinette's tears hadn't stopped flowing. Her hands came up to grip Luka’s wrist even as she tucked her head into his chest and stained his shirt with them. She started crying anew, throwing herself into her grief.

“Ssh,” Luka soothed, petting her gorgeous, black hair. “Marinette, it’ll be okay. I don’t know what’s going on, but it’ll be okay.”

His heart went out to her. Had he done this? Had he been akumatized? 

That checked out. Luka couldn’t remember anything over the past… however long it had been since they’d gone to yell at Bob Roth.

Luka must have done something to her. He must have hurt her, even though that was the last thing he ever wanted to do. He cursed himself for his weakness. Even if it were Hawkmoth in control of his akumatized form, he’d made a deal with the devil and allowed himself to harm Marinette. 

Marinette. He had no idea why she was crying. His heart twisted in his chest.

Luka didn’t want her to stop, not necessarily. She clearly needed to cry herself out over whatever the problem was. He just wished he knew what he’d done to upset her so. He had no idea why he felt like vomiting from painful, full-body tremors.

It was as if he’d been a rubber band stretched to its breaking point, snapping back into a body that couldn’t handle anything around him. Especially not a distressed Marinette.

Racked with guilt and limbs shaking, Luka held onto her with all his strength. He felt her body shake against his, her breath hitching twice as she tried to compose herself.

Finally, she seemed to find the words to start to explain. “I-It wasn’t supposed to be this way,” she whimpered, raising her head to pierce his very soul with her mournful, blue eyes. 

“What wasn’t?” Luka whispered back, nibbling on his lower lip. He felt a hole and tongued it, tasting blood. _When did I bite a hole in my lip?_

“My…” she started, and immediately stopped. “Oh. You don’t remember any of it, do you?”

Luka shook his head, the very motion setting his skull to pounding. “What happened?”

Marientte tucked her chin to her chest. She seemed to be staring at her hands, which were clutching Luka’s trembling wrists. Her voice sounded both defensive and defeated. “Nothing.”

Luka felt tense and strung out, his mind screaming at him to soothe both his and her hurts. He worried she was in as much physical pain as he was, but she didn’t give off any signs of that, just emotional pain. “You can’t tell me?”

Marinette’s posture stiffened suddenly. Her eyebrows drew together and she gave him an inward stare--a shocked, deeply pained look. She let out a forceful breath and seemed to have difficulty forming words. “N-No. I can’t.”

In response, Luka pulled her further into his lap. He shifted position, moving his stiff, throbbing legs out from their kneeling to wrap around her body cross-legged. “It’s all right, Marinette,” he said neutrally, trying not to let his disappointment show. “You can tell me everything. Or nothing, if you prefer.” He drew a deep, steadying breath through his nose. “You can be yourself with me, you know. Just yourself.”

Marinette didn’t respond in the way he expected. She gave a deliberate, angry shake of her head, her mouth forming a round “O.” Then her gaze softened. “Luka, I…” Her eyes seemed to water again, and to his horror, she sniffled. He wondered if she was going to start crying again. “You were akumatized.”

The news landed with a thud. Luka had figured that’s what had happened, that he’d hurt her somehow. But suspecting that and hearing it confirmed were two different things. “Why are you hurting?” 

Why was _he_ hurting? His arms and legs throbbed from the mysterious internal wounds, forcing bile to his lips and making him dizzy. His mind spun; his cheeks flushed with shame. How could he have been akumatized so easily? How could he have hurt Marinette? He was useless.

Marinette poked her tongue against her cheek while exhaling. “You… made me do something I didn’t want to do.”

Luka’s heart stuttered in his chest. His gut writhed; he felt instantly nauseated. “Marinette,” he whispered, his throat dry and his mouth parched. “Tell me I didn’t force myself on you.”

“No!” Marinette cried, her head whipping up, almost cracking his nose with her forehead as he leaned over her. He pulled back, not wanting to loom over her or threaten her. If he’d done _that_ , if he’d forced her to… He’d never forgive himself. 

She lifted herself up on her knees between his thighs and cupped his cheeks, staring deep into his eyes. “You didn’t do that, Luka. You would _never_ do that.” And then she started to ramble. “I mean, you did? Sort of? You… But not in that way! Oh, gosh, Luka, Luka, no, don’t cry!” 

Luka was well and truly bawling now, his lip quivering and his chest tight. His nose felt blocked up with snot; he tried to clear it with a long, drawn-out sniff. He let go of her, driving the heels of his hands into his eyes and pulling back to force her to let go of him. Her fingers burned trails over his cheeks as she trailed the tips over his skin. 

He panted, trying to calm himself as she awkwardly patted his shoulder. How could he have been so weak? He’d given into anger and hate, and allowed someone to hurt Marinette using his body. _Luka_ had hurt her. His rage and thirst for vengeance had hurt her. 

And Luka had forced himself on her. He didn’t deserve to love her, to cherish her in the way she deserved to be cherished. He’d probably scarred her for life. She would never forgive him. 

Nor should she.

His physical pain meant nothing now. It was his heart that pained him, blown about in his chest like a wind chime in a hurricane. He could no sooner hold the heartbreak in himself than he could hold back gale force winds. 

Marinette peeled one of his hands away from his face, kneading his palm in her small, strong thumbs. He couldn’t bear to look at her face, so he focused on her fingers, on her grounding touch. He hiccuped, whimpering. 

“Luka,” she whispered, pressing a kiss to his fingertips. She pinched his fingers and stroked his palms, and he wanted to pull his hand away. He didn’t deserve her attention. But he didn’t pull away. He desired her touch. 

He was so _weak._

Marinette wasn’t done with him. She rubbed circles into his wrist. He hissed involuntarily; that hurt. His arms and legs and chest were still tender from whatever had happened to him. Whatever it was that she wouldn’t explain.

She blinked at him and lessened the pressure, but didn’t stop stroking his skin. “You didn’t do that. I promise.”

“B-But I hurt you,” he choked out, not knowing why she wouldn’t just admit the truth. He’d done something terrible. Something irrevocable. And she wouldn’t tell him what.

“You… did,” Marinette said, and Luka chomped down on his lip again, wincing at the sharp sting. He felt blood welling up from the cut and spreading over his front teeth as he nibbled. “But not in the way you think.”

Luka let loose a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. “Okay,” he said, less firmly than he’d like. His voice still wavered, holding back more blubbering. He was on the precipice of weeping again. “But what did I do?”

Marinette couldn’t meet his eye. Digging her thumbnail into the meat of his palm, she shook her head again, this time as sharp as a knife. “I can’t tell you.”

Marinette had so many secrets for a girl so young. She still seemed to like Luka. Maybe not as much as he liked her, but he hoped a little. But most importantly, she didn’t trust him. Luka didn’t know how to feel about that.

If she didn’t tell him what he’d done, he was free to imagine whatever came to mind. And right now, his mind was going to some dark and terrible places.

Shifting again in an effort to be more comfortable, Luka switched tactics. “Chat Noir seemed upset, too.”

Marinette flinched. She pulled away from Luka, and he let her go. She knelt on the floor near him, crossing her arms over her middle and shivering. “Y-Yeah, he… He was.”

Color fled her face. Her shoulders curled in on themselves. She mumbled in a quaking voice, seemingly to herself, and Luka only caught pieces of what she was saying. “...didn’t know. He couldn’t... known. And now… Oh, gosh, Luka! He _knows_!” 

Her eyes were wide and whirling, darting about from place to place as if Chat Noir would materialize out of nowhere and attack her. She looked absolutely terrified, her hands shaking and her cheeks pallid.

Luka wasn’t sure if he should reach out for her like he wanted to. He wasn’t sure if his touch would be welcomed. His hands hurt; he wished she would go back to massaging them--no! He didn’t deserve that level of care.

Just thinking about what he’d done, his stomach revolted; he looked around for a bowl or a trash can or something to empty it. Seeing nothing in the hallway, he swallowed the vomit in his mouth.

“What?” Luka said finally, wanting to draw her out of her shell. “What does Chat know?”

Marinette groaned, rocking back and forth and hugging herself. “It’s not important. It has nothing to do with akumas.”

Luka was so confused. This certainly sounded important to him. He agonized over the fact that she was lying to him--had potentially been lying to him since the beginning. She held some deep secret that she couldn’t tell anyone. One that maybe involved akumas…? And one that Chat Noir was not supposed to know.

The penny dropped. 

Luka didn’t know how he didn’t see it before. Marinette wore pigtails; Ladybug wore pigtails. Marinette was a lycee student with a lithe build; Ladybug was a lycee student with a lithe build. Marinette was the bravest girl he’d ever met; Ladybug had had to be brave, too.

And if Marinette really was Ladybug, she needed support more than ever. 

Even from someone who had hurt her.

Luka couldn’t abandon her now.

Swallowing his revulsion against his touching her and possibly hurting her, Luka took her hand. “Marinette,” he whispered, grimacing at the burning stiffness in his limbs. He wanted to press a kiss to her wrist--but at the same time he did _not_ want to do that. He didn’t know when he’d allow himself to be comfortable touching her again. He hoped it would be soon.

“Yes, Luka?” 

Luka nearly gasped. Her eyes were shining with admiration. With love. With trust.

She still trusted him? Even after everything?

He couldn’t betray that fledgling trust.

“If you can help me stand,” he said, nearly choking at how fragile his voice sounded, “I can take you home.”

He hoped he didn’t need to lean on her. He felt spasms in his legs at the very thought of standing. 

Marinette’s eyes widened. “You can’t stand?”

Luka shook his head, wincing. “Probably not?”

“What?” Marinette exploded, her words just this side of shrill. Her hands fluttered around her face. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I didn’t want you to worry!” Luka cried, hating how his voice bordered on a whine.

“Luka Couffaine!” Marinette snapped, glaring at him. “If you are too weak to stand, you need to _tell me._ I care for you, you know!”

Tears pricked Luka’s eyes. She cared for him? After he’d done _that_?

Luka wanted to go home and sleep for a week.

Marinette scooted closer to him and looped his arm around her shoulders, circling her hand around his waist. “On three. Ready?”

He nodded.

“One,” she counted, and his legs tensed up. “Two… three!”

Standing was agony. Luka didn’t know how he was going to make it to Marinette’s house from Montparnasse.

But he did. They took a taxi as soon as they stepped outside the tower. Luka paid.

Before the car pulled away from the bakery, Marinette squeezed his hand through the window. “Text me when you get home?”

“I promise,” Luka lied. He didn’t know if he would be able to text her. He didn’t know what to say, and he didn’t deserve to blow up her phone.

Marinette seemed to sense his hesitation. “I’ll text you.”

“Okay.”

She released him, and the taxi drove off towards the north side of the Seine, where the Liberty was docked.

Luka leaned his head against the headrest of the seat. He closed his eyes, trying to shut out the events of the day and the prickling pain that crawled across his flesh. 

Then Ladybug’s magical helpers flowed over him, removing the hurt entirely…

And Luka cried.

**Author's Note:**

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> 
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